Although wallpapering is currently less popular, it is nevertheless carried out quite well. Therefore, many walls are already coated elsewhere. So for example with color. Therefore, the question quickly arises as to whether you can wallpaper a painted wall.

It depends on the wall color used

One thing in advance: in most cases, the wallpapering of a painted wall will be completely unproblematic. But there are definitely colors where more preparation work is necessary. Increased environmental awareness has also affected the colors used.

Today used water-soluble colors

Today, many colors are used as wall coverings, which were used in principle for centuries before the "technification" in the 20th century. These include wall paints such as the following:

distemper

clay paints

whitewash

All these colors have in common that they use as "binder" a substance that is not used in the chemical industry so: water. In other words, such colors are water-soluble. Now, when wallpapering the wallpaper paste is applied, which is also based on water, the risk is very high that the wallpaper falls off again. Instead of drying well and sticking, the underlying paint is dissolved and the substrate is thus unstable.

Wearing wall paint is unknown

In particular, in apartments and houses, in which the wall coverings of previous residents are still present, it can often not be determined what kind of wall paints it is. Therefore, only one test helps here. With a quast you should wet a small area well with water.

At the same time check the absorbency of the wall

This also has a useful side effect: you can also determine the absorbency of the wall itself here. Test the wall coating again and again in the first few minutes after applying the water. To do this, you can repeatedly stroke the wall with your finger with medium pressure. If the color does not dissolve until it dries, you can wallpaper it without any problem.

Wash off water-soluble paint before wallpapering

However, if the color dissolves, as soon as it gets wet, you have to make further preparations before wallpapering. Then the color should be washed off. After washing the wall, however, it must first dry again. So this is a work that you should do preferably in the spring or summer.

Tips & Tricks

You may have noticed in this test that the wall is not very absorbent. Then you also have to prepare the wall accordingly. To do this, you use role waste. These are to be worn as described on the instructions for use. Then the wallpaper sticks well on poorly absorbent ground well.